One in four people in the U.S. lives with chronic pain and over the course of the past 20 years, more people have turned to opioids as a way to treat or manage that pain. That is why the AMA developed an online module to teach resident physicians how to approach prescribing opioids safely and appropriately to ensure effective and equitable pain management while minimizing risk.
Safer Prescribing of Opioids for Pain Management” is just one of the AMA GME Competency Education Program offerings, which includes more than 50 courses that residents can access online through their residency program’s subscription, on their own schedules. The program also features six faculty development courses.
The AMA GME Competency Education Program delivers education to help institutions more easily meet Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) common program requirements. Modules cover five of the six ACGME core competencies—patient care, practice-based learning and improvement, interpersonal and communication skills, professionalism, and system-based practice. The sixth, medical knowledge, is one that is most often directly addressed during clinical education.
Among the program’s experts are several who contributed to the AMA’s Health Systems Science textbook, which draws insights from faculty at medical schools that are part of the Association’s ChangeMedEd initiative.
Current program subscribers have access to award-winning online education designed for residents on the go. It’s easy to use and saves time with simple tracking and reporting tools for administrators. Learn more.
Guide to better decision-making
This course, which offers an overview and application of safer opioid prescribing practices through five patient interactions, is in alignment with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) 2022 clinical practice guideline on prescribing opioids for pain.
At the conclusion of the course, residents and other learners should be able to:
- Describe the CDC clinical practice guideline recommendations and guiding principles for safer opioid prescribing.
- Apply the safer opioid prescribing recommendations and guiding principles to patient interactions.
By adhering to these guidelines and applying CDC recommendations for prescribing opioids, resident physicians and other learners will be able to make more informed clinical decisions about:
- Whether to initiate opioids for pain.
- Selecting opioids and determining dosages.
- The duration of initial opioid prescription and conducting follow up.
- Assessing risk and addressing potential harms of opioid use.
Residents will learn about the guiding principles for implementation, which are to:
- Assess and treat acute, subacute and chronic pain appropriately, regardless of whether opioids are part of a treatment regimen.
- Support individualized, person-centered care, ensuring flexibility for specific patient needs.
- Use a multimodal, multidisciplinary approach to pain management, addressing physical and behavioral health, long-term support and overall well-being.
- Avoid misapplying guidelines or implementing related policies that may harm patients.
- Address health inequities, provide culturally and linguistically appropriate communication, ensure accessibility for disabilities, and offer diverse, coordinated pain-management options.
The AMA believes that science, evidence, and compassion must continue to guide patient care and policy change as the nation’s opioid epidemic has become a more dangerous and complicated illicit drug-overdose epidemic. Learn more at the AMA’s End the Epidemic website.
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Strong conversation starters
Safety should be emphasized at every step of the process, and that includes conversations with patients. Residents will learn about effective conversation-starters with patients on various topics. For example, to assess previous treatments and ensure the patient is informed about nonopioid options, the physician can ask: “Before we consider opioids, can we review the other methods you've tried to manage your pain and how they've worked for you?"
And to explain the rationale for starting with the lowest dose and the importance of follow-ups, physicians can say, “It's important to balance effective pain relief while minimizing risk, including understanding any unique risks related to your current medications. How comfortable are you with frequent check-ins to monitor your progress?”
Residents also learn how to discuss potential risks, address concerns and ensure the patient understands how to mitigate harm. To do so, physicians might ask, “Given your medical history, we need to be particularly careful with opioid use. Do you have any concerns that you think we should discuss?"
The module includes numerous useful links and downloadable documents, as well as a case-based quiz to test learners’ knowledge of the subject matter.
Easy to track progress
Residency program directors have access to dashboards and reports that provide a view of progress at the program and institution levels. In addition, customizable reports make it easy to track learner performance and demonstrate compliance for accreditation.
The AMA GME Competency Education Program covers topics including well-being, quality improvement and patient safety, residents as teachers, navigating health systems, professionalism and faculty development. Schedule a meeting to discuss your organization’s needs.
